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News Releases

On the fifth anniversary of the wrong-headed Citizens United decision, the need to get big money out of our elections couldn’t be greater. U.S. PIRG applauds the reintroduction of critical reform legislation by over a dozen leaders in Congress today, including the Democracy for All Amendment, introduced by Senator Tom Udall, and the Government by the People Act, introduced by Rep. John Sarbanes.

The State of the Union address is the President's opportunity to articulate his priorities. In a time of divided government, action on many of the President's priorities will require an agreement with Congress. However, it is notable the range of issues raised by the President where he and his Administration can take action independent of Congress. We list our U.S. PIRG position on key highlights:

Standard & Poor’s (S&P), the bond-rating agency whose past practices have been tied to the mortgage crisis, is in negotiations with the U.S. Justice Department to settle allegations of civil fraud with a payout of over $1 billion. Unless the Justice Department specifically forbids it, the deal could allow S&P to claim the payment as a deductible business expense worth more than $350 million.

Statement of Consumer Program Director Ed Mierzwinski: "This week, the U.S. House of Representatives passed two awful bills on behalf of Wall Street and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. One bill weakens important 2010 financial system reforms designed to prevent another financial system collapse like the one in 2008 that occurred due to Wall Street malfeasance. The second imposes massive roadblocks in front of any agency, from EPA and FDA to the financial regulators, seeking to protect the public's health, safety or wallets. We will seek to block these bills in the Senate and at the White House."

U.S. PIRG today released a new study, “The Money Chase: Moving from Big Money Dominance in the 2014 Midterms to a Small Donor Democracy,” at a joint research summit with seven other major money in politics organizations. The study, which was written by U.S. PIRG and Demos, found that the top two vote-getters in the 25 most competitive districts in 2014 got 86 percent of their campaign contributions from individuals giving $200 or more. Only two of the 50 candidates surveyed raised less than 70 percent of their individual contributions from big donors, and seven relied on big donors for more than 95 percent of their individual contributions.